This is a new way for me to express my frustration with American politics and social policy. If anyone reads and comments on this blog, he probably won't be happy with me. If you are a liberal, I will challenge your most closely held beliefs. If you are a conservative, I will challenge your assertion of conservatism.
We are at a crossroads in the U.S. Liberals are so intent on making every issue a class struggle or a race issue that they offer little. Conservatives are so captured by the religious right and intent on destroying personal freedom in the United States that they are dangerous.
The Tea Partiers are a response to both these trends. I am not a TP person. Fareed Zakaria's show today said the TPers are about economic issues. If that is true and they stay out of my pocketbook and bedroom, maybe I can support them. Time will tell.
Whoa. The lady in Delaware dabbled in witchcraft and that makes her unelectable. Well, Bill committed perjury and shook his finger while lied on national television until the tart took out the little blue dress. Hillary destroyed the travel documents (lost on a table in the White House?). Karl Rove leaked and lied. Rangel thinks taxes are only paid by the chumps (remember the hotel lady?). Since when is being untruthful or screwy a detriment to being elected?
ReplyDeleteThe bubble heads inveighed against the Tea Party last night. TPers are sometimes a bit strange. But, the republic survived a professional wrestler and still has at least one comic (he earned his living at it) in the Senate. Surely, we can survive a wrestling promoter and a "dabbling" witch.
ReplyDeleteWhat the talking heads, and I presume the politiians, don't understand is the disgust most Americans feel with a $1.3 trillion deficit. I challenged one candidate (who lost) about whether she would sign a no new tax pledge. She sidestepped with a rant about pork barrels. Attachments such as these account for .7 percent (that's POINT SEVEN) of the federal budget. The message, Tea Party or whoever, needs to send it--STOP SPENDING.
Americans need to stop demanding more spending and stop supporting local politicians who do, even if the politicos bring the pork home.
Ever wonder why Arizona passed its "immigration bill"? Try following the federal government's inaction and now fraudulent prosecution of CURRENT FEDERAL law.
ReplyDeleteKeep in mind: We need immigration and thinking Americans support immigration. BUT, it must be according to the law. We are a nation of laws.
Our good friends who have languished in the green card process for years are as disgusted by U.S. immigration policy as I am.
The feds refused to act--Arizona did not. When do we get sanity?
Former President Jimmy Carter faults Fox News for distorting the news and ignoring the facts. I say, "Good for Fox." J.S.Mill taught us that truth in collision with error will always see truth win.
ReplyDeleteWe NEED inaccuracies so that we as a people learn to sort the wheat from the chaff.
See: http://www.philosophyparadise.com/quotes/mill.html
The peculiar evil of silencing the expression of an opinion is, that it is robbing the human race; posterity as well as the existing generation; those who dissent from the opinion, still more than those who hold it. If the opinion is right, they are deprived of the opportunity of exchanging error for truth: if wrong, they lose, what is almost as great a benefit, the clearer perception and livelier impression of truth, produced by its collision with error.
John Stuart Mill
What part of illegal alien is difficult to understand. If you are here illegally, you need to go back to your country of origin and apply to be in this county legally. Arizona's illegal immigration law is a mirror of the federal law. State, local and county law enforcement do not want to enforce the immigration law as they already have a full plate enforcing state, county and local laws and ordinances. When the United States Federal Government posts signs along its interstate highways warning of dangers of drug and human smugglers for U.S. citizens traveling within their own county there is something wrong with that. If the current administration does not want to enforce immigration laws the state should be allowed to protect the citizenry. Fortunately, Arizona statutes allow law abiding citizens to carry loaded firearms and are allowed to protect themselves and others who are in fear of great bodily harm and death. I return fire.
ReplyDeleteRiots in Ecuador this week. We worry for our dear friends there. Riots in France and Belgium. While I do not understand the specifics of the economies of any of these countries, I do understand that government expenditures cannot grow indefinitely as the government taxes its citizens unendingly. I equally understand that we, the people, often demand more that we are willing to be taxed to pay for. That with politicians pandering to our every desire so they can stay in office, is the road to ruin.
ReplyDeleteto quote john stuart mill here seems disingenuous... he made that quote in, what, 1850?
ReplyDeleteto compare public discourse in 1850 to multibillion dollar multinational media conglomerates like fox is just silly. Fox operates under a false veneer of credibility by being branded as news, when it is beyond argument that it is not a news outlet, but an opinion outlet, dedicated wholly to corporate and right wing agendas.
For carter to point this out is not "silencing the expression" under any reasonable interpretation. He's expressing his opinion, one that I completely agree with.
While Mill's quote may be provably true in the abstract long view (like in 100 years when we all realize global warming and corporate cronyism has doomed us), I don't think that is the spirit in which he made the claim!
Disingenuous? Defined at Dictionary.com thusly: lacking in frankness, candor, or sincerity; falsely or hypocritically ingenuous; insincere.
ReplyDeleteI take exception to the suggestion I am lacking candor, frankness or candor. Wrong? Perhaps, but genuine.
Additionally, the real question is: When truth collides with error, does truth win? I posit the answer is "yes." I did not look up the quote that presupposes the necessity of error to "illumine" truth. Mills may be dated, but the concept is still accurate.
Newton defined gravity many centuries ago, but it is as true today as then..
Today's reading suggestion. Daniel Hannan is a member of the European Parliament and a frequent visitor and commentator on the U.S. His book, "The New Road to Serfdom: A Letter of Warning to America," is an excellent read.
ReplyDeleteThe road in America that began in 1933 is disastrous for what this country represented at its founding.
I'm on a roll. I also recommend Martin L. Gross's book, "National Suicide." See the reading list for the complete citation.
ReplyDeleteIn 1817, Thomas Jefferson wrote:
ReplyDeleteTo preserve our independence, we must not let our rulers load us with perpetual debt. We must make our election between economy and liberty, or profusion and servitude.
Precisely how long will it take to pay off the TRILLIONS in debt amassed by the U.S. government? (a good share of which is owned by the Chinese).
When my son complained that I got my way most of the time, I told him: "Son, the man who pays the bills calls the shots." Right now, foreigners own a goodly chunk of U.S. public debt. Sooner or later, those bill payers will expect to call the shots.
I believe that truth in collision with error always sees truth win. I really do.
ReplyDeleteWhat I perceive as disingenuous in your post is:
1) you equate carter pointing out that fox is dangerously full of bull as being carter engaging in the "peculiar evil of silencing the expression of an opinion." That's nonsense and you know it! He's giving his opinion on fox's slanted opinions. Where is the silencing of expression? I know you know the media well enough to know that your equivalency is at best a stretch.
2) There is the implication in your post that as long as truth wins out, all is ok, as if fox news and actual facts are just in some academic debate where there is a winner and a loser and no harm done. That may have been closer to the case in Mills' time, but the sophisticated propaganda machine that fox employs has real world implications, and very serious ones.
They full well realize that they are lying to people... they aren't trying to win a battle of "truth." They are just trying to preach to idiot 30% of america that is the low information voter... people that WON'T seek out the collision of truth and error. Because by doing so, they can swing a few elections and heck, maybe get some whack job like Palin or Huckabee elected and laugh all the way to their diversified corporate portfolio bank. Fox isn't in "error" when they lie, they are doing it on purpose, and if they succeed in keeping real action on global warming or health care or immigration from happening, people are going to DIE as a result.
So that's what I meant by disingenuous... i think you know that it's not a academic issue but a real, serious one.
Of course, I'd had several beers watching monday night football when I posted that, so perhaps I was overly harsh! :)
Somewhere in the marketplace of ideas there has to be both truth and error. The task set for the rational man is to find both and discern the difference. I don't know if it's an academic exercise or not, but it is critical in any event for the functioning of a democracy.
ReplyDeleteI read the Palin/Huckabee rants in much the same way I read the Obama/Franks rants from my conservative friends. Both are good, whether we accept that or not.
We NEED those fringe views to help us right the center. Maybe Monday I will have a couple of beers and watch football. That might soften/change my view!
Read Hannan's and Gross's books in particular for a reasoned but different view!
Removed?
ReplyDeleteI hope not
ReplyDeleteWell, I sit here perplexed (as usual). The constitution give the federal government certain responsibilities. National defense, interstate commerce, etc.
ReplyDeleteI got perplexed when the feds took the Western states to task when those states said they would not enforce federal gun control laws (the constitutional basis is???). Those Western states said they would allow firearms manufactured, sold and used within their borders to do so unfettered by federal firearms regulations.
Now, Eric Holder says he will enforce federal drug laws if California passes Prop 19 (and the constitutional basis is????).
When did the federal government get the right to regulate whatever it wants to regulate, including our bodies, firearms and intoxicant of preference?
Somebody clue me in.
Is it just me or do we elect politicians to they can get their next campaign started?
ReplyDeleteWell, Great Britain will lay off 490,000 government workers. That will be quite a hit to their economy. As I thought about how this would play out in the U.S., I realized we will never do anything similar. \
ReplyDeleteEven though we face $1.3 trillion this fiscal year, we continue to spend like drunken sailors. No heed for the future, satiate our current desires.
On this course, I believe the end of Pax Americana draws nigh.